A common and popular type of purse or like bag has a top that includes at least a region that is upwardly open in use. Often this type of bag is rather deep, permitting the owner-user to store a variety of items. Further, such depth is generally considered fashionable. A known drawback of the above-described purse or like bag configuration resides in the difficulty of readily retrieving objects, such as keys, pens, flashlights, magnifying glasses, eye pieces, coin purses, USB keys, key fobs (security token), access card keys, fast passes, credit cards, bank cards or a group thereof gathered on a chain or other retention device, from its interior. This can lead to the frustration of the owner-user and to others. For example, the difficulty of locating car keys at the bottom of a purse can cause significant delay in vacating a parking space. A useful apparatus that addresses the problem of finding keys is the novel ALEXX FINDERS KEY PURSE. The ALEXX FINDERS KEY PURSE is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,537,032; 7,308,922; and D539,526, which are hereby incorporated by reference.
While the ALEXX FINDERS KEY PURSE is an outstanding product in its own right, the FINDERS KEY PURSE does not protect the purse or like bag, and is specifically directed to the retention of keys. To illustrate the limitations of the ALEXX FINDERS KEY PURSE, consider the problem posed when dining at a restaurant. Often, the only location to place the purse or like bag is under a chair, where it can easily be damaged by accidental trampling, or soiled because it is on the floor. Moreover, such a location for the bag is not secure because it not visible to the owner, and thus is susceptible to being lost or stolen. Because of the high costs of purses and like bags, it would be desirable to have a device that not only acts as a key locator, like the ALEXX FINDERS KEY PURSE, but further protects the purse or like bag when the purse or like bag is not being carried and further can be used to retain other objects besides just keys.
Given the above importance of the above identified objectives, what are needed in the art are improved apparatus for holding and storing objects such as keys and for protecting purses and like bags when such purses and like bags are not in use.